You're reading: Lawyer Nikolai Polozov: ​Savchenko not on hunger strike, but eating little

Ukrainian citizen Nadia Savchenko, who is charged with complicity in the killing of Russian journalists, continues eating little, her lawyer Nikolai Polozov said.


“Nadia Viktorivna is not on a hunger strike. She is eating some food,” Polozov told Interfax.

The lawyer said Savchenko has given him an address to delegates of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on the opening of the PACE session. “She is unhappy that the debate on her claim filed with the Basmanny Court regarding her immunity as a PACE delegate is being delayed. However, she is generally fine and is ready to continue fighting,” Polozov said.

The lawyer also said the investigators “have still not provided any test that directly or indirectly points to Nadia Savchenko’s involvement in the death of Kornelyuk and Voloshin.”

Mikhail Fedotov, the head of the presidential human rights council, earlier said there are no big concerns about Savchenko’s health. “Her state of health is satisfactory,” Fedotov told Interfax after visiting Savchenko in the detention facility on Monday.

“Nadia Savchenko now weighs around sixty kilos. She weighed over eighty when she was detained. In the period of her hunger strike her weight dropped to 55 kilos,” he said.

Fedotov visited Savchenko with Yelizaveta Glinka, a member of the human rights council.

“Nadia Savchenko said she intends to defend her innocence in court, through she says her hope for a fair trial is decreasing. The investigator is familiarizing her with some case materials. As she said, no tests have yet confirmed her involvement in the Russian journalists’ death,” Fedotov said.

“She really cares for the success of the Minsk agreements, she is distressed for the tragedy that has occurred in eastern Ukraine,” he said.

He said Glinka has told Savchenko about the situation in Donbas.

Last summer, Savchenko fought in eastern Ukraine in the volunteer battalion Aidar. On July 8, 2014, it became known that she was kept in a detention facility in Voronezh. She was transferred to a detention facility in Moscow on September 24.

The pilot is charged with complicity in the killing of Russian journalists Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin near Luhansk in June 2014. She is also charged with illegally crossing the Russian border.

Savchenko does not admit her guilt and says she was captured by the Luhansk People’s Republic militia and was then illegally taken from Ukraine to Russia.

To protest her arrest, Savchenko went on hunger strike on December 15, 2014. On March 5, she agreed to eat broth due to her worsened condition. However, she resumed her hunger strike on March 16. She is now eating a minimal amount to be able to attend court hearings. Her detention has now been extended until May 13.